How ’bout a vegetarian lunch? Whaaaat, me, sharp-fanged old carnivore that I am? Really? Oh, yes, my friends, sometimes the vegetarian route, even in my greasy old meatatarian hands, leads to a fine meal indeed. As an eater, I can always latch onto that old saying ‘I’m just happy to be here’. Whatever goodness is on offer.
Vegetarian meals, particularly in summertime, can be marvelously easy to prepare and not get me horribly overheated when I am fighting off the internal flames already. Let me be honest, my dearies, I am over fifty, a prodigy of sorts who got the great gift of hot flashes starting at the ripe young age of forty, so cookery that doesn’t require a whole lot of, well, cooking is a generally welcome thing these days. So, darlings, back to our regularly scheduled programming.
Salad. That’s always an easy start. So keep it easy. Romaine lettuce, diced ripe pear. Sliced almonds, white and black sesame seeds. A touch of lemon juice. Couple of spoons full of the pickling liquid from sushi ginger, a lick of Persian lime olive oil and a jot of toasted sesame oil. Fresh, fast, cooling, nice.
Not that I’m opposed to heated stuff. After all, the physiological truth is that eating and drinking warm treats is pretty good at starting the body’s cooling mechanisms to work. Cool! Really! So this time around, I went with one of those dishes that are basic throw-and-go foods. Oven roasted cauliflower, fine; oven roasted me: too much of a good thing. So in a lightly oiled casserole I put a couple of cups of broken cauliflower florets, straight from the freezer (not previously cooked), tossed on a few teaspoons of cold browned butter, a couple of tablespoons of pine nuts, a handful of brown mustard seeds, and a quarter cup or so of shredded Parmesan cheese. Into the cold oven it all went at 350°F, covered for the first fifteen minutes and then uncovered until browned, and lastly left covered again at table to keep steaming while the rest of the meal got set.
The rest included some good gluten-free crackers to spread with almond butter and peach chutney, a few of my homemade sesame crackers and smoked almonds, and some cornichons and pickled lotus for a touch further of pizzazz. My favorite part of the meal–not a huge surprise in this hot summertime, I suppose–happened to be the day’s beverage. I put a cup each of peeled and seeded cucumber pieces, chopped fresh celery, cubed honeydew melon and fresh mint leaves into the blender with about a pint of water and the juice of a whole lime and a tablespoon or two of raw honey, gave it all a thorough smash-up, and then strained it. When I drank the blended juices straight up, that was lovely, so if you want your zing without cane sugar or effervescence, just leave out added pop. I’d chilled it that way a couple of days before, but to serve it, I combined it with equal amounts of cucumber soda (Mr. Q Cumber, yummy stuff), and it made a good, refreshing accompaniment to the rest of the meal.
Best accompaniment, of course, is always the good companionship of a fine fellow eater at the table. Yes, thanks, this was a delicious day.
Art-Colored Glasses 
That cauliflower simply looks delicious! Must remember the recipe 🙂
Too easy to even call it a recipe–and wonderfully changeable. One of the things I so love about cauliflower! 🙂
Firstly, I LOVE your green glasses – just too gorgeous for words. I too have been known to enjoy the odd veggie meal – more than I thought I would actually, although having said that, not sure I could go without my meat.
🙂 Mandy xo
They *are* gorgeous glasses–but not mine. I photographed them in town a week or so ago when I stopped in one of the shops and of course these beauties caught my eye!! Yes, I do love meat too, so it’s not likely to fall off the regular menu here anytime soon. 😉
xoxo
You’re exactly right about warm drinks being more cooling in hot climates. When I lived in West Africa, one of the first things I was taught was to drink warm, not iced, tea.
Where in the world would a person find something like Persian lime olive oil? It sounds marvelous, but I’ve never seen such a thing. If it’s one of those Dean & DeLucca type specialties, I’ll improvise! Likewise, cucumber soda. I suppose I’ll have to make a trip into Houston to Whole Foods. 😉
Lovely glassware. Depression glass?
I imagine the glass is mostly Depression stuff (see my note to Mandy above). Pretty, pretty! The lime olive oil is from Stonehouse, whose blood orange and lemon and other oils are also favorites of ours. We first tasted them at the Stonehouse shop in San Francisco (at the Ferry terminal) but they sell online (http://stonehouseoliveoil.com/store/persian_lime_olive_oil_256754710.html), thankfully for this other Texan! The soda is from Cost Plus World Market here–I see there are four CPWMs located in the greater Houston area–but I suspect there are others who carry it. Happy eating and drinking, my dear! 🙂
I’d grown tired of both cauliflower and broccoli some years ago. If I had either more than twice a year it was too much. Then I started roasting them both.Well, that certainly changed everything. Now, not a week goes by where I don’t have one or the other, if not both. Once I fix cauliflower “your” way, I’ll probably have even more often — I’ll still have some meat on my plate, though.
I can only imagine that there are a million ways in the Italian kitchen to make roasted cauliflower and broccoli even grander treats than they already are! This way, I suppose, would qualify as pseudo-Italiano, given the ingredients, and yes, it *is* mighty tasty. 🙂 With or without meat!
Marvelous Meatless Meal! I’m always open to going veg a few times a week. It works, as long as I also grill some sausages for Hubby 😉
Yes, Richard prefers to get something meaty on the plate along with the other stuff, too, and I’m certainly fine with that. In fact, he doesn’t like many vegetables, so I get most of them anyway. 😉
Mmmmm, crunchie seeds & salty nutties…
Two of my favorite food features, crunch and salt . . . 🙂
We should make a movie– worse concepts are out there, right?
😉